Oxford, MI -- Detroit Auxiliary Bishop Leonard Blair told a
convention of 180 Regnum Christi women from throughout North America
that God wants an "intensely personal" response to the vocation
he offers each of us. Bishop Blair adressed the group
at a special mass during a Women´s International Formators Convention
entitled, "To Know and Love the Church of Christ," held
the week of April 7 at Queen of the Family
Retreat Center in Oxford, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit.

Reflecting on
the Feast of the Annunciation, which the Church celebrated on
April 8 instead of March 25 because of Holy Week,
Bishop Blair urged the women to think of Mary´s fiat,
her "yes" to the angel Gabriel, as an example today
of what God wants from them.

"Think of it!" Bishop
Balir said. "The woman Mary´s fiat (fiat meaning ´let it
be´ in Latin), her ´yes,´ is the most important and
decisive answer ever uttered by one of God´s creatures for
as long as time shall last. Without her womanly ´yes´
there could be no conception and birth of the eternal
Word, no fulfillment of God´s plan for our redemption. You
and I are caught up in the ´yes´ that Mary
gave. Not only do we reap the benefits of her
answer, but we too have to say ´yes.´

"But ´yes´
to what?" the Bishop asked. "There are many ways
to answer that question. Obviously we say ´yes´ to
the gift of life; ´yes´ to God in Christ; ´yes´
to our Catholic faith; to what the church believes and
teaches. If we were baptized as infants -- as
most of us were -- it was our parents and
godparents who first said ´yes´ for us. As we grow
up, we have to learn to make that baptismal ´yes´
our own," he explained.

"Our ´yes´ to God only becomes fully
mature when we understand, like Mary, that what God wants
of us is intensely personal. Each of us has
a unique vocation and mission from him: a vocation and
mission to be someone and to accomplish something in this
world. What God wants is our ´yes´ to the
vocation and mission he wills for our salvation and for
our role in the salvation of the world.

"You might think
of it this way. What we are saying ´yes´
to is God´s ´holiness plan´ for us: his personalized, unique
vocation and mission plan for us. We have no
way to know from day to day what life will
bring. Just as Mary, on the day of the Annunciation,
could not possibly have known what lay in store for
her. Yet in faith she said ´yes´, and we have
to do the same."

To help the Regnum Christi women understand
God´s "holiness plan" for them, the convention offered four different
tracks: one for women who help others grow in the
Regnum Christi vocation, one for women who help others grow
in their spiritual lives, one for those who work with
youth programs, and one for young people who go on
missions.

The convention drew attendees from as far north as Alberta
in Canada and as far south as Florida. "Part of
the fun is the different personalities that women from different
regions bring to the convention," said Mary Pieczynski, one of
the event´s organizers. "The women from Louisiana, for instance, quickly
became known as a fun, high-spirited group."

Bishop Blair said
it´s important to put that spirit of joy at the
service of the Church.

"In the ´yes´ of countless women like
yourselves, all of us -- men and women -- learn
how to bring about the Holy Father´s vision of a
´civilization of love marked by a radical affirmation of the
value of life and the value of love.”